Why are telemarketers (which is just a fancy term for phone solicitors) even allowed to do business in this country? I do not know of anyone who receives these calls who considers them beneficial to society.

Just since yesterday--a period of about 24 hours--I have received three--three!--"courtesy calls" as regarding healthcare insurance. (Even if I truly needed such insurance--which I do not, as I am fully covered--I would certainly not buy from someone hawking his--or her--goods over the phone.)

I suppose that defenders of this annoying practice might cite First Amendment protections. But even these are not absolute. The Supreme Court, for instance, has ruled that there is no right to shout "Fire!" in a crowded theater.

Can others here relate to my severe irritation at this?

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"In his second inaugural address, [Franklin D.] Roosevelt sought 'unimagined power' to enforce the 'proper subordination' of private power to public power. He got it…"—George Will, July 8, 2007

I work from a home office and have my home phone on my desk. I bet I get 4 or 5 unsolicited calls a day. It is getting to the point that I am considering changing my home phone number.

BTW, the old adage that you can't shout fire in crowded theater is not entirely correct. You most certainly can shout fire in any crowded room provided it is to warn people of an actual fire. What you cannot do is unnecessarily induce panic that could potentially cause harm to others.

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To argue with a person who has renounced the use of reason is like administering medicine to the dead - Thomas Paine

I put annoying solicitors and hold, play Ice JJ Fish's super hit, "On the Floor", for a couple of minutes, then come back and tell them nobody is available to take their call, which is very important to us. I do this especially with those dumbasses who call about a problem with my Windows computer. On those, after they hold patiently, I ask if they can fix a Commodore 64. One of them threatened to put me in prison because he said I was being a smart ass to him. Hey! I was serious about my C64!

When they start giving their spiel say "hold on one second, I need to take something off the stove" or some other excuse. Then set the phone down, don't hang up, and go about what you were doing. It runs up their phone bill and you can get back to what you were doing.

The ones that really annoy me are the ones that start out as automated calls and ask you to press a number to indicate you are willing to hear their pitch.
They get to interrupt your day at no cost in man-hours, and only if you say you are interested do you speak to somebody.
Such calls are actually illegal in the U.S.

Below describes a free service I read about which describes how it can help you turn the tables on such calls and avoid them.

Nomorobo piggybacks off a feature offered by most major phone carriers called "simultaneous ring." Foss said it's similar to call-forwarding.

When a consumer signs up with Nomorobo, he gets assigned a new phone number that rings simultaneously when somebody calls his existing landline or cell phone. When a robocall comes in, it rings once on the consumer's existing number and again, simultaneously, on the Nomorobo number, where an algorithm determines in a fraction of a second whether it's from a real person or from a robo-caller. If from the latter, a recording asks the caller to enter a number on their keypad.

Since no human being is yet on the line, no response is made, and Nomorobo dismisses the call before it can ring again. Thus, the consumer knows that any call that rings more than once is legit -- or at least that it comes from a real person rather than a robot.

The service is offered free to consumers. Foss makes money by charging commercial users a fee based on their call volume. Ironically, he said, call centers for legitimate businesses -- say, ones selling flowers through an 800 number -- get hit by robocallers the same way consumers do. They can't afford to have their lines tied up by automated calls, so they turn to Foss' company for relief.

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“Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.”
~Abraham Lincoln

The Following 4 Users Say Thank You to foundit66 For This Useful Post:

I don't remember where I heard about it, but I was told that if you anser what ends up being a pre-recorded message, just hit '2' as many times as you can, and supposedly it deletes your number from their system.

I'm about over the 'one ringer' calls, that are trying to bait you into calling them back. Anyone who needs to talk to me, knows how to reach me. Leaving a message is one of them.

__________________Your life is the sum total of the choices you make.If you don't laugh at yourself, a whole bunch of people will volunteer to do it for youI never lose. I either win, or I learn....

I don't remember where I heard about it, but I was told that if you anser what ends up being a pre-recorded message, just hit '2' as many times as you can, and supposedly it deletes your number from their system.

I'm about over the 'one ringer' calls, that are trying to bait you into calling them back. Anyone who needs to talk to me, knows how to reach me. Leaving a message is one of them.

Thank's, I go home for lunch everyday to check on the animals and I get 2-3 recorded calls. Monday at noon, I'm hittin' # 2

My wife suggested a new way of dealing with telemarketers. (Actually, she did not come up with it, originally. She just passed it on to me.)

Whenever my phone shows that the call is from another town or city--and I have no friends or relatives there--I simply answer the phone as follows:

"Gooooooood morning! This is Phillip Johnston, and yoooooooou're on the air!"

It has worked very well the two times that I have tried it so far. I was met with stunned silence both times.

(Obviously, this will not work with robocalls.)

__________________
"In his second inaugural address, [Franklin D.] Roosevelt sought 'unimagined power' to enforce the 'proper subordination' of private power to public power. He got it…"—George Will, July 8, 2007